When Gods Were Men
by Dyskolos
Summary: Dean Winchester was 16 years old, living in a foster home, and trying to stop obsessing over his long lost little brother when he began seeing a man with a trench coat and tortured blue eyes. AU, for the most part.
1. Chapter 1

Rated T for language, bitchy teenage POV, and non-graphic, off-screen child abuse.

Sam, Bobby, and possibly others will come into this fic later, and there will eventually be references to the universe of the show.

Chapter 1

The first time Dean saw him, it was a Tuesday, and he was pissed.

He was sitting in the passenger seat of a crappy Honda sporting a peeling puke-green paint job and an engine with a knock that sounded like something was trying to get out, tugging on a loose fiber on the hem of his shirt and watching the dark fabric unravel like it was the most interesting thing he'd seen in weeks because, fuck, it _was._

His latest social worker—Julia—was nervously tapping her dark red dragon-lady fingernails on the back of the steering wheel as she drove, beating out a tiny tuneless song that made Dean long for the (totally not stolen) Metallica tapes shoved in his garbage bag of possessions in the truck. She was prattling on about the new home they were sticking him in—about how "kind" the couple was, how good their track record was with "rehabilitating" kids, what "exciting" opportunities there were at the local high school …all the while stealing uneasy glances at his scratched and bruised knuckles like her was going to snap and pop her, right there, right now.

Julia could kiss his ass. Seriously. And if she tried to scoot her shapeless behind another inch away from him, he was going to live up to that "potentially dangerous" red flag stuck in his file.

"Where are we going again?" Dean asked, cutting her off mid-yammer. He had been staring out the grimy window for hours, seeing nothing but miles of cornfields and cows, which, in Kansas, narrowed it down to pretty much _anywhere_. She shuffled, using one clawed hand to flick at an imaginary fly-away hair, continuing to tap on the steering wheel. _Click. Click. Click._

"Overbrook, Kansas." As if Dean was too stoned to remember the state he had lived his entire life. "Home of the state's best cinnamon waffles," she added with a fluttery laugh.

"Cinnamon waffles," he echoed. Actually, compared to the shit food they slopped on your plates at the government houses, cinnamon waffles sounded kind of awesome, but that wasn't going to stop him from acting bitchy if he fucking wanted to act bitchy. "Well, tickle my pig and call me Shirley."

Julia blinked. "I—I'm sorry?"

Dean sighed, scrubbing a hand over his freckled face and through his short hair, seriously considering upgrading this one from annoying to full-on stupid bitch. "Nothing. Don't worry about it, sweetheart." He rolled his eyes as she shifted uneasily, the tempo of her tapping increasing. _Click, click, click, click,_ filled the tense air within the car. Dean let his gaze drift back out the window, briefly considering trying to determine the ratio between cow and pile of shit in the field they were currently driving past. He decided against it. Too much effort. He rested his forehead on the cool glass and closed his eyes.

Sometime later, there was a hand gently shaking his shoulder, and he unstuck his eyelids, blinking blearily to see the same shitty interior of the same shitty car, with Julia eyeing him anxiously from the driver's seat.

"We're here, Dean," Julia informed him, faking a cheerful smile with nicotine and tea-stained teeth. "Home sweet home."

Dean snorted as he shoved the door open. After a few dozen homes, they stopped being so sweet. He stepped out of the car and onto the sidewalk, narrowing his green eyes against the assaultive glare of the sun as he seized up this new place.

At first glance, it was pretty…non-descript. Dean's seen a lot worse, and a lot better. The house was three-stories, bigger than Dean's used to, but that wasn't surprising, if it really held the eight kids that Julia said it did. It was painted a boring beige, with an even-cut if parched front lawn and clean windows with dark curtains drawn tight across them. And after the last home, that little sketchy fact made Dean's skin prickle, and he tensed his muscles against the shudder threatening to run through them.

Doing his best to shove down his misgivings—not _fear_ , because he's not a freaking _girl_ — Dean walked slowly around the car, popped the trunk, and extricated his garbage bag of meager belongings. He threw it over one shoulder, feeling the corner of his Walkman cutting into his back just below his shoulder blade, and scuffed his well-worn boots on the asphalt as he followed Julia up the driveway. The social worker paused with one finger halfway to the doorbell, turning to face him.

"Dean…" she began, her words coming out at a glacial pace and thick with apprehension. "I feel you should know…there aren't a lot of homes who are willing to take you on anymore. After the…incident in Leavenworth, many of our parents expressed a certain concern about you. They don't want to…"

"To what?" Dean interrupted, feeling the heat rise up under his skin. "Take on a head case with anger management issues like me?"

Julia blanched. "I didn't say that, Dean. I just…" she swallowed, her eyes skittering around the door, the yard, the car, anywhere but Dean's hard glare. "This might be your last opportunity to find a good home. I don't want you to waste it."

"Like you give a damn about me," Dean replied darkly, and before she could let out another word, he reached out and stabbed the bell, hearing the muffled _ding-dong_ through the heavy metal door. He glanced over his shoulder, suddenly needing to make sure he had an out, an escape he could take if it somehow came to that, and that's when Dean saw him.

He was standing on the sidewalk across the street, arms hanging loosely at his sides and a deep frown etched on his face. He was wearing a white shirt, blue tie, and—was that a trench coat? But given the undeniable suburby feel of this neighborhood, a dude in a suit wasn't that unusual, except for the fact that he was rooted to the spot, just fucking _staring_ at Dean with two deep blue vortexes for eyes.

"Dean?"

"Wha—?" Dean blinked, turning his gaze back to Julia. The door had opened, and a couple was standing there, smiling at him. The woman was short, with shoulder length brown hair and bangs that hung nearly low enough to cover the small wrinkles around her dark brown eyes. The man was taller but still shrimpy, with curly black hair, hazel eyes blurred behind thick glasses, and a slightly more forced smile than his wife. Normally, Dean would be beginning Phase One of the New Foster Parent Evaluation System, but all he could think about was the weird guy across the street.

"Aren't you going to say hello, Dean?" the social worker prompted. Dean grunted in response.

And when he turned back around, the man was gone.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

All in all, the new home was really not that bad, although Dean would never say it aloud. The fridge was always full of food they could take whenever they pleased (even if it was far too healthy for his liking), there was a working color TV available, and, so far, the parents didn't seem to get drunk, violent, or handsy, which was a plus. On the Dean Winchester Scale of Foster Home Shittiness, (with 10 being Head for the Hills and 1 being pretty much unattainable) he gave it about a 4. So, not that bad.

He was the second oldest of the kids, who ranged in age from 8 to 17. Dean liked it when he was placed in houses with young kids; it always made him feel like he had a purpose, like it was his job to protect them. And somehow, looking out for them made him feel a little less shitty.

Because Dean remembered having a little brother. He remembered harsh, shrill sobs at midnight and bottles of milk. He remembered Sam being shoved into his arms ( _"Now, Dean, go!"_ ), struggling to keep a hold on him as he kicked and screamed in fear ( _"It's okay, Sammy"_ ), and staring at into the tiredly sympathetic eyes of the man who told him his parents weren't coming out ( _"I'm sorry, son…"_ ), and how loud Sammy had wailed when they ripped him from Dean's arms. Keeping an eye on the little kids sometimes made him forget what a worthless shit he was. But he tried (mostly unsuccessfully) not to think about that, or about Sammy.

The school wasn't that bad, either. The whole "exciting opportunities" thing was bull, of course, but the teachers and other students were used to having foster kids around, so at least they didn't make him feel like a freak. And because it was right next to the elementary school and within walking distance of the home, he and most of the other kids from his house could hang out after classes and play on the playground and basketball courts.

And he was doing just that, a week and two days later, Thursday afternoon, trying to teach a skinny 9 year old (3 years younger than Sammy was now, Dean's fucking traitor of a brain calculated) named Nathan to shoot a free throw when trench coat guy made another appearance.

"Here," he was saying, positioning the kid's twiggy arms. "Use your left hand to guide it, and your right to give it the strength to reach the basket. You good?"

Nathan nodded once, eyes narrowed in concentration, teeth gritted, and if Dean didn't know better he would have guessed the kid was trying to poop. His knobby knees bent and then straightened and the ball sailed through the air in perfect arc…nicking the bottom of the net and rolling off into the grass. Nathan let out a sigh rife with disappointment, as Terry, their 15 year old "foster brother" (God, Dean hated that term with an inexplicable passion), started snickering.

"Oh, shut up," Dean snapped. He made sure to give Terry a good shove with one shoulder as he passed, and that shut the little asshat up, and least until he stopped back-wheeling and stumbling and started cursing. Dean ignored him as he reached for the ball. "That was good, Nate, just—"

As he straightened up, holding the damp ball with his fingertips, trying not to dirty up his (relatively) new jacket, his gaze caught on a figure standing by the edge of the tennis court. Dean's brain quickly catalogued his features—dark hair, suit, trench coat, piercing blue eyes staring directly into him with a laser focus that made Dean's skin crawl. He blinked, half-expecting the dude to disappear.

He didn't. Well, fuck. A cold electric shock jolted down Dean's spine, the hairs standing up on the back of his neck like this was some crappy horror movie and trench coat dude was about to sprout fangs or barf pea soup or start sparkling. He felt his cheeks heat up—why the hell was this scrawny tax account psyching him out? Tossing the basketball behind him, Dean fixed Trench Coat with his best don't-fuck-with-me, make-middle-aged-white-ladies-cross-the-street, at-risk-youth glare.

Trench Coat's already impressive frown deepened, and he cocked his head to one side. No shit. It was like when a puppy gets confused. But the guy didn't break his stare.

The uncomfortable knot forming in Dean's stomach was seriously pissing him off, so he shoved down all his fear and misgivings, jammed a cork of equal parts bluster and rage down on top of them, and marched up to him.

"Hey," he growled, voice low and gravelly enough to make his throat hurt.

Trench Coat blinked. "Hello," he responded, and fuck it all if he didn't beat out Dean's own affected gravel voice by a mile. And, infuriatingly enough, he was refusing to be properly intimidated. Dean would jump right into it, then.

"Are you following me?"

"No," Trench Coat frowned. "I'm not following you. I'm just…finding you."

"What?" Of all of the responses Dean could have expected, that wasn't one of them. In his experience, the creepers tended to be less forthcoming about their creepiness. He took an instinctive step backward.

"I think I'm supposed to find you," Trench Coat said, still staring at him with that disturbing intensity. "I need—"

"I'm not giving you anything you _need_ ," Dean snarled. "If you want to get your dick wet, go somewhere else!"

Trench Coat blinked, looking perplexed, but stayed put, which made no fucking sense, because the middle-class pervs in suits had wives and their own children and usually fled when you made it clear you weren't the kind of kid who would help them with their _needs_. "Why would I want my genitalia moistened?"

Then it was Dean's turn to be confused, because this guy was falling into none of the many categories of creeps he'd encountered. "Just stay the hell away from me!" He turned away, seeing the kids playing on the court, fighting over the ball. "And from the other kids, too. Go to a fucking strip club, or something."

Without waiting for the guy's reaction, he stalked back over to the court, trying to hide how much Trench Coat had rattled him. But if that guy even thought about coming near the little kids, Dean would break his nose, and other parts of his anatomy.

Nate was still standing on the foul line with the other younger boys and girls clustered around him, looking bereft as the older kids squabbled loudly around them. They all automatically turned hopeful gazes to Dean, after only a week already expecting him to stand up for them and get their ball back. But he couldn't keep them here while Trench Coat was skulking around. "We're leaving." He raised his voice. "All of you!"

Terry scowled. "You don't get to boss us around."

"Like hell I don't." Dean said. "And you see that guy over there? Don't _ever_ go near him, you get me? And run away and find me if he comes near you."

Nate followed the direction of Dean's gesture, frowning. "Dean? I don't see anyone over there."

"What?" Dean looked over his shoulder—the kid was right. Apparently Trench Coat had wised up and made a break for it. "The guy I was just talking to."

The kids exchanged uneasy glances. "Uh…" Stephie, an 8 year old, spoke up, her eyes wide and wet, stumbling over the words like she was afraid to say them. "You…you weren't talking to anyone."

"Huh?"

"Yeah," 10 year old Sara added. "You just walked over and stood there, with no one around. We thought it was kind of weird, but…"

Dean tried to swallow the lump rising in his throat. There _had_ been a guy there. He wasn't fucking crazy.

Was he?

"C'mon," he mumbled. "Let's just go."


	3. Chapter 3

_A/N: Thanks so much for the reviews! They motivate me to post more often, so please keep them coming!_

Chapter 3

For the next few weeks, all Dean could think about was Trench Coat. He did his best to forget, to just write the guy off as yet another creep in a long line of creeps, but he couldn't. It just didn't make sense. For one, he acted nothing like the normal pervs, who skulked around in secluded parking lots and dark alleys, sidling up to the scrawniest, most vulnerable looking kid that fit their twisted type, and hauling ass once they figured out they weren't gonna get what they wanted. No, instead Trench Coat was brazen, came out in the daylight hours, and acted more like Rain Man than your classic sexual predator. And then there was the fact that apparently Dean was the only one who could see him. He didn't even want to touch that particular piece of batshit crazy.

Dean had spent weeks looking over his shoulder for a flash of beige or blue eyes, hustling the kids home, his fight or flight reflex always humming under his skin.

What he needed was a serious distraction, Dean concluded. To take his mind off the guy. To get stupid drunk. To get fucking laid.

Dean was lounging on his bed, flicking through a mental catalogue of hot girls from the school who seemed to be into bad boys, when Malcolm walked in.

Malcolm was the oldest kid in the house, only 5 months from turning 18 and "getting the hell out of here." Dean shared a room with him and Terry, and had already spent hours upon hours listening to Malcolm's grand plans for when he was an adult and able to go out on his own. The kid was full of shit, frankly, because if he really was the freedom-loving wild man he claimed he would have taken off already, legal adult or not. But the guy was one of the prominent popular douchebags at school, and it was Friday night, so if there was a party anywhere in this boring-ass town, he would know about it.

So when Dean asked him, he expected to get the address of some kid whose parents were away for the weekend, or the name of a bar that was lax about the whole legal drinking age thing, or at least a ride to the nearest field for loud music, binge-drinking and setting things on fire. What he did not expect was the response he got:

"That depends, Winchester. You a pussy?"

Dean sat up on his bed. "What?"

Malcolm smirked at him from where he was standing in front of a mirror, tugging and twisting at strands of his hair like he was getting ready for his television debut. "You know the old Wheeler house, out past the football field?"

"What?" Dean said again, annoyed this time, because he doesn't make a census of every building in every godforsaken town he ends up in.

"It's an abandoned old piece of shit that dates back to, like, Bleeding Kansas times. And apparently, it's haunted. A bunch of us are going to get some booze and spend the night there."

Dean snorted. "Well, damned if that doesn't sound like the plot of every crappy horror movie ever made."

"I know. But what can I say? That kind of shit turns girls on."

"What, the undead?"

"Danger! Think about it." Malcolm was rooting around his bed now, pulling a bottle of vodka out from under his mattress—marshmallow flavored vodka. Jesus. "You're in this creepy house, with cobwebs and boarded up windows and shit, and you and some hot chick go off together into another room, and suddenly there's a weird noise and she gets scared, and then she's looking for someone to protect her…"

"Yeah, yeah, I get it." Dean waved him off before he got into the gritty details. The whole set-up seemed kind of gross, and he didn't exactly relish the idea of having his first date in months take place in some condemned shithole, but it looked like it was either that or another night of watching the paint peel off his walls.

"Alright. Fuck it. Let's go to the haunted house."

* * *

The house was admittedly pretty creepy, in that clichéd, warped windows, creaky floorboards, three inches of dust on every surface kind of way. Dean felt like he'd wandered onto the set of a B horror flick, and the only ones of their six-person group who were going to see the dawn were the leggy blonde and the douchiest guy.

It was one am and pitch black when they pulled up at the Wheeler house. One of Malcolm's friends had picked them up in his parents' car, and then they'd circled around town to get their dates. The guy—Chase or Chad or something—had called it "collecting the night's entertainment," in such a swarmy way that Dean had briefly considered barrel-rolling out the car.

The girls were pretty cute, though. There were two brunettes, one with a short curly bob and the other with a long braid hanging over one shoulder—their names were Jenny and Penny, conveniently enough—and a redhead with gray eyes named Leila.

Malcolm was telling the story of the last owner of the house in an overdramatic whisper as they wandered around the first floor. Dean was barely listening—it was taking most of his attention to avoid stepping on a rusty nail and dying of tetanus.

"…and then, after he burned the girls' stuff, the evidence he came back here, and you know what was waiting for him?"

"The world's ugliest wallpaper?" Dean said, eyeing the grayed and hideous floral patterns.

Malcolm ignored him and continued his tale. "One of the girls' dad was a cop, right? And he figured out who killed his daughter, and was waiting in the house with his gun, and as soon as Wheeler walked in—BAM!"

He slapped his hands together, and Jenny and Penny squealed. "But he didn't kill the guy on the first shot, right? He wanted his daughter's murdered to _suffer_ , so he blew out both his kneecaps, and then broke all his fingers and tore out his eyes, and—"

"Let's go the basement!" Chase/Chad interrupted. "That's probably the really haunted part, right?"

They trooped around, searching for the stairs, and Dean began to seriously question his decision to come here. What exactly was gonna happen now? A group make-out session in the basement? Taking turns on the musty old couch?

They had found the stairs, and had started to creep down it, the brunette girls lapsing into nervous laughter every time the stairs moaned under their weight. Dean hesitated, wondering if he should just bail and walk back to the house. It wasn't close by any definition, but Dean had walked much, much farther on his many stints as a runaway, without any guarantee of a warm bed and free food at the end of the day.

"There's no way I'm going down there," Leila said, standing at the top of the steps. "Not because I'm scared of ghosts, because I think this whole thing is bullshit, but because I haven't had a tetanus booster in a while."

Dean turned toward her in surprise, and true to her word, there wasn't a trace of fear in her face. Her pretty gray eyes were clear and intelligent, her lips quirked in a sly smile. All plans of leaving left his brain instantly. He closed the door to the basement (as much as you can close a door that's falling off its hinges) and put on his best cocky and flirty grin, the one that had lost him his virginity as a freshman to the hottest senior girl.

"So, if you're not into the whole house of horrors thing, why are you here?"

Leila tucked some hair behind her ear, her eyes locking into his. "Well, Jen told me the new guy would be here, and I figured that would be worth a little dust and some"—her lips twisted a little—"bad wallpaper."

This night had turned around quickly. Dean's grin grew. "Yeah, but what about the rats?"

She laughed. "Yeah, I could do without those." Her eyes sharpened. "But I think you could make it worth my while."

Showtime. Dean leaned in. "No doubt about it, sweetheart. How about we—"

" _You shouldn't be in here_."

"What?"

Dean looked around for the source of the high, echoy female voice. The basement door was still closed. Had one of the other girls found another staircase…?

Leila sucked in a sharp breath. "What the _hell_."

Dean whipped around, following her shocked gaze, and felt his mouth drop open.

A girl, maybe fourteen or fifteen, was standing not ten feet away from them, wearing a dirty and ripped white dress. There was no way she could have gotten in here without them hearing, no way, except that wasn't the weird part. The weird part, the part that had him frozen, was the way the girl was gray and shimmering, like an image on a TV with crappy reception. Dean would think he really had lost it this time, if it wasn't for the fact that Leila was seeing the same thing.

They stared in shock for a few more seconds as the girl stared back at them, her eyes fearful and sunken in deep purple bruises. She was flickering, like—like—

Like a ghost. Except that was insane. Ghosts weren't real.

" _You have to leave now. He's coming_."

"This isn't funny, Malcolm." Dean finally said, hating the way his voice shook a little. It had to be a prank, right? Some Scooby-Doo shit that he would kick Malcom's ass for in the morning.

" _Get out! Get oooooooout!_ " Her voice broke into a high-pitched wail that lingered after he disappeared.

"What the hell," Leila said again, and Dean realized that she had his arm in a death-grip. "What the _hell_."

Malcolm, Douche and the girls thundered up the stairs and pushed past them into the room. "We heard screaming," Penny said breathlessly. "What—?"

"Oh, like you don't know," Dean snapped at Malcolm. "Is this your idea of a joke, asshole? Promise me you won't do standup, okay?" He turned, pulling Leila toward the door.

"What? I didn't do anything—"

And then suddenly the air was full of screaming, and Dean flinched with his whole body.

A man reared up in front of them, flickering and off-color like the girl, his face twisted in ferocious snarl. His mutilated body was riddled with wounds leaking black blood, and his arms and legs were bent and broken as he lumbered towards them. It was easily the most disgusting thing that Dean had ever seen.

"The door!" Dean shouted. "Get to the door! Get out of here!"

He surged forward, dragging Leila with him, and then they staggered back as the man appeared in front of them, his face close enough that Dean could see the rage in one of his eyes. He barely had time to register that his other eye was dangling from the socket as he lashed out wildly, and he felt something grip his wrist, and then the room flipped around and he crashed hard to the ground, his vision going white.

Dean blinked rapidly, trying to haul his aching body up, and saw the other kids had clustered around the door, beating on it and screaming, but not getting out. Penny was emitting a constant shrieking noise as she tried to smash the windows.

But there were only four of them trying to break their way out—where was Leila?

Dean managed to roll onto his back, searching for her. He felt a wave of terror and panic as he saw her sprawled on the ground, face red and gasping, the mangled man hovering over her, its twisted hands clasped over her throat.

"No!" Dean pulled himself up, trying to throw himself toward her, to save her, but his knee buckled underneath him with a blast of white-hot pain and he collapsed to the filthy floor. He could hear Leila choking, hear her _dying_ , and how was this possible, how had everything gone to shit so fast, how could this be happening—?

The door burst open, and a blast of impossibly bright blue-white light filled the room. Dean squinted into the light, wondering if he was dying, too, and then the light faded and standing in the door, his tie flipped up, his blues wild—

And Dean really had gone balls to the wall, foaming at the mouth crazy, because standing in the doorway was Trench Coat.


	4. Chapter 4

_Hey! Thanks so much for keeping with it this far. This is my first time writing this kind of story, and I'd love feedback, positive or negative. Please review!  
_

 _This chapter is short, so sorry about that. The next should be longer._

Chapter 4

 _And maybe Dean really had gone balls to the wall, foaming at the mouth crazy, because standing in the doorway was Trench Coat._

Dean gaped, his bad leg curled painfully under him, as Trench Coat bore down the mangled ghost-man, his hands outstretched and—and _glowing_.

The ghost-man shrank away from Trench Coat's light-bearing hands, and he released Leila. She was still and pale, her chest barely moving. Dean tried to crawl toward her, but the pain in his knee took his breath away and little sparks were swirling in front of his eyes and he glanced down to see that his whole lower leg was twisted in the wrong direction. It was like one of those gross-out medical photos that you look at in horror through your fingers, except that he was seeing it in real-time and in full living color. And it was attached to his body. Dean was wracked with a wave of nausea.

He looked back up, Trench Coat was still there, backing the ghost into the corner. The thing which had been choking the life out of Leila, which had thrown him across the room and Daffy Ducked his leg with no effort, cowered before Trench Coat's hands. Trench Coat laid one glowing hand on its forehead.

The thing howled in pain, and Dean watched in amazement as the thing began to dissolve, light seeming to run from Trench Coat's hand, pour into its mutilated body, and then burst out of the thing's skin in bright beams. It was happening right in front of his face and still unbelievable. It was like watching an avenging angel.

In a few seconds, the thing completely crumbled into dust. Trench Coat turned, his eyes scanning the room and landing on Dean. Trench Coat rushed over, and Dean stared wide-eyed as the man dropped to his knees.

"Dean! Are you alright?"

"How—how—?" Dean stammered. Trench Coat was staring at him in a way that was completely unfamiliar to Dean. It wasn't predatory, or fearful, or even the confused look Trench Coat had given him before. It was frighteningly intense, full of feeling, full of _concern_. It wasn't the way you looked at a stranger. Dean could really only guess, but he'd say it was the way you looked at _family_.

Trench Coat glanced around the room. "Where's Sam? Is he hurt?"

Dean's stomach clenched, a chill spreading over his skin. How the hell did Trench Coat know about _Sam_? Dean never talked about him, ever. _No one_ knew about Sam.

Before he could respond, he heard a rasping, rattling gasp, and he turned his attention back to Leila. Her eyes were wide open now, and full of panic as she struggled to breathe through her damaged throat.

"Leila…" Dean's mind scrambled for how to help her. He didn't know any first aid. His leg was too damaged to get to the door, much less a phone, and Malcolm and the rest of them has fled as soon as Trench Coat ripped open the door.

Trench Coat followed his gaze, and quickly moved to Leila's side. He rested one of his hands on her chest. There was another burst of blue-white light, and Leila slumped back onto the floor, her eyes shut.

"What did you do?" Dean demanded. She was breathing, wasn't she? He hadn't…"What did you do?"

Trench Coat frowned at him. "I healed her. Your leg is injured, too. Let me—"

He moved back to Dean's side, and Dean couldn't help flinching. This situation was so insane. He just wanted to be back in the house, fast asleep on his ancient mattress. "Get back!"

Trench Coat's frown deepened. "Dean, I'm just—" Trench Coat's face suddenly went slack, a little of the lost, confused look returning to his eyes. "You're young," he murmured. "Dean, you're so young, I don't—"

They stared at each other for a moment, both confused into silence. Leila stirred, her eyelids fluttering, and Dean instinctively tried to move over to her again, almost screaming in pain as he moved his cartoonishly destroyed leg.

Trench Coat reached out, and before Dean could protest his hand landed on Dean's knee. Dean braced for intense pain, but the leg just felt cold, and then pleasantly warm. He looked down, and was stunned to see his leg was straight again, his foot facing forward, all the pain was gone. "You healed me," he said. "How did you…?"

"This isn't right," Trench Coat was saying. "This isn't…Where's Sam, Dean? Why isn't he here?"

Dean stood, and buckled a bit, but his leg took his weight. "How the hell do you know about Sam? Who _are_ _you_?" he demanded.

Trench Coat stood up. "What do you mean? Of course I know Sam. He's your brother."

"How do you know that?" he asked, his voice rough and shaking. "I haven't seen Sam since he was a baby, so how could you possibly know about him? Who are you? Tell me who you are!"

"Something is very wrong," Trench Coat muttered. "I remember now. I have to…" He looked around, brow furrowed. "My name is Castiel. And I'm…" he swallowed, and his eyes snapped back to Dean's gaze. "I'm coming back. I don't know what's happening…I can't remember …but I promise I'll fix it, Dean."

Castiel disappeared with a whisper of wingbeats, leaving Dean staring at an empty spot on the floor. Not knowing what else to do, he knelt at Leila's side, reassuring her as she opened her eyes and took a few panicked breaths.

The girl—the _ghost_ of a girl—was suddenly standing above them. The bruises were gone from her eyes, and her dress was intact and clean. She smiled at him. " _He's gone_ ," she said. " _He's finally gone. Thank you_." And then she flickered out of existence, too, leaving Dean and Leila alone.


	5. Chapter 5

_A/N: Longest chapter yet! Please review! Even just drop a line of gibberish or a smiley face to let me know you're out there and enjoying it! (Or a frowny face if you are not feeling it).  
_

Chapter 5

Leila was dazed as they stumbled out of the house, and Dean was wondering how exactly he was going to get her home when he didn't know where she lived and she was too out of it to tell him, when the car pulled around, Malcolm hanging out of the passenger window, shouting in wild-eyed amazement, "Oh my God! I can't believe you're still alive!"

Dean ignored the dumbass comment and piled himself and Leila into the car, and they burned some rubber rocketing down the road toward town.

After a long debate, they decided not to call the cops. Malcolm just wanted to forget about it, Douche and Penny didn't want their parents to know they'd snuck out, Jenny maintained that the mangled man-ghost had been a mass delusion, nothing more, and Leila was too groggy to do more than tell everybody to shut the hell up and take her home so she could sleep. Dean, for his part, knew that no cop would be able to handle whatever the fuck had happened in that house. And he was pretty sure that Trench Coat had somehow destroyed the man.

The next day, while Malcolm stays in bed with the covers pulled tight over his head like he was trying to smother himself, Dean goes to the library. The fosters, Don and Helena, practically cried with joy when he asked for directions, convinced that their loving home had banished his delinquent tendencies and instilled him with a lifelong love of learning, all within a month.

Dean lets them think that, because at least he gets a ride out of it. At the library, he asks around about the Wheeler house until someone directs him to their old newspaper files, where Dean digs up a series of articles detailing the life and crimes of old man Jeremiah Wheeler.

Back in the '20s, Dean reads, Wheeler had gone on a killing spree, abducting and strangling a dozen teenage girls. All redheads, like Leila. The dad of one of the first victims was a cop, and he worked her case obsessively until he tracked down Wheeler and tortured him to death. The newspaper was too prim and proper to print all the grisly details, but mentioned that Wheeler had gunshot wounds and dozens of broken bones when his killer turned the body into the police. The house had been condemned and unoccupied since Wheeler's death.

Dean finds a picture of the cop's daughter, smiling shyly at the camera. It's unmistakably, undeniably the girl from the house.

Dean goes outside for a while, shoving his fist in his mouth to stop himself from screaming.

Because he always knew the world was an unfair, hellish, fucked-up place, but he'd never expected that it was an unfair, hellish, fucked-up place with _ghosts_ in it.

And then there was Trench Coat—or rather, _Castiel_ , easily the dumbest name Dean had ever heard. Except Dean was having a hard time mocking the guy, even in his head, seeing as he'd watched him vanquish a ghost, bring a girl back from the brink of death, and heal his twisted knee.

Dean asked a librarian if she'd ever heard the name Castiel, and she blinked in confusion and sent him to other librarian, who sent him to yet _another_ librarian who puttered around the stacks for a while and then pressed a musty-as-fuck book entitled Gustav's Dictionary of Angels into his hands. Dean's heart pounded in his chest as flipped to the 'C' section.

Most of the other entries were paragraphs long, pages long, but there was a single sentence next to the name Castiel: _A Thursday angel mentioned in occult lore._

Dean wondered what exactly _occult lore_ meant, because that sounded like sound creepy shit, inverted pentagrams and hushed chanting in darkened rooms, and he wondered if there were multiple Thursday angels because it said _a_ Thursday angel, not _the_ Thursday angel, but multiple angels for a day of the week seemed like pretty bad resource allocation, and he wondered how long it took this Gustav guy to put together this giant-ass list of angel names, most of which just look like strings of random letters to him.

Dean wondered all these things, because it was easier than wondering why an angel of the Lord was stalking him.

Dean gave the book back and wandered the streets, trying to clear his head and figure out what the hell was going on. So, maybe he had a guardian angel, who had gotten stoned one day and forgotten he wasn't supposed to stop and chat?

Except if he had a guardian angel, it had been doing a pretty piss-poor job when it let his parents die, let his brother be taken from him, and let him end up in a string of crappy homes with crappy foster parents who knocked him around. No, Dean could accept a world with child murdering ghosts in it, that jived with his life experiences, but he couldn't believe in a world where something divine was looking out for him. And so Castiel was either lying about being an angel, or angels were creepy assholes.

Dean knew that he should just let this go, treat it as a one-time storm of crazy shit and steer clear of condemned houses from now on.

But Castiel had known about _Sam_ , and Dean couldn't let that go.

* * *

So Dean ended up in a stretch of woods next to the baseball field, because after his last home, even the idea of going into a church freaked him out. And he flatly refused to do the whole on-your-knees, hands-clasped-to-the-forehead thing, so instead he leaned awkwardly against a tree and prayed for the first time in his life.

"Hey, _Castiel_ ," Dean spat, with more confidence than he felt. "Get the hell down here, now. You need to explain some things to me."

The leaves swayed gently in the breeze, and he heard a cricket. A few minutes passed, and Dean began to feel very, very stupid. He was about to leave, when he heard a shudder of feathery wingbeats and wheeled around.

Castiel was standing behind him, _right_ behind him, his hair tousled and his tie backward. Dean took a stumbling step back, because the guy was way, way too close. "You called for me," Castiel said, with hint of awe—or maybe relief?—in his voice.

Dean cut to the chase. "What the hell are you?"

Castiel sighed. "Dean—"

"Don't bullshit me." Dean set his jaw, reluctant to even let the words pass his lips, but he had to ask. "Are you an angel?"

"Yes." Castiel met his gaze for a moment, and then his eyes went unfocused, his gaze sliding above Dean's head. "Or at least I was."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"It's difficult to explain. I don't remember everything. I just…" he swallowed. "I just know I needed to help you. I was drawn to you, even when I couldn't remember my own name."

Dean was so not touching that _drawn to you_ line, because he's already met (and gone pretty fucking far past) his quota of weird shit for the week. "You talked like you knew me last night. You talked like…like you knew Sam. My brother."

Castiel's eyes got even more distant. "I did, but—" he shook his head, making a scoffing noise of frustration. "Everything is different here. You're too young, and Sam should be with you."

Dean's heart thudded against his chest. He swallowed the emotion building in his throat and pushed on. "You said that before. Why do think I should be older? And what do you mean, everything is different _here_? Where else is there?"

Castiel sighed again, furrowing his brow. "I'm not sure. Everything is blurry. All I know is that a few weeks ago, I found myself _here,_ with no memories, with nothing, except…" his eyes found Dean's again, with that same unfamiliar intensity. "Except you. I knew I had to find you, even though I didn't know who you were, who _I_ was…But then, when I found you at the haunted house, and I saw the ghost…I remembered. Not everything, but a few things." Castiel trailed off again, staring into space.

"What, are you just gonna be cryptic? Spell it out."

"Of course. I'm sorry. I remembered my own name, that I am an angel, or that I was, once. And I remembered you, Dean. You were my friend. You and your brother were my friends."

"Yeah, that sounds lovely," Dean snapped, his stomach churning. "Except I don't know you, and I haven't seen Sam since he was a baby, so _what the hell_?"

"It's difficult to explain. I don't really understand it myself. If I could just—" Castiel stepped forward, reaching out his hand toward Dean, two fingers extended and headed for his head. Dean jerked back.

"Don't touch me," he growled. He wanted the words to bleed with fierceness and rage, but they came out sounding frightened and childish.

Castiel pulled back, frowning, his eyes shining with something Dean couldn't name. "I'm sorry. I didn't…I'm sorry. I'll try to explain. I believe that we're somehow in a space and time distinct from the one I came from, where I knew you and your brother later in your lives. Where you and your brother lived your whole lives together." That sad look crept over his face again and clouded his eyes. "For the most part."

Dean's eyebrows shot up. "An alternate reality? Really, that's what you're going with? Quit switching genres on me, dude. Is this theology or science-fiction?"

"Is it any crazier than what you saw last night?"

Dean stalked in a circle, beating at the branches as he went, trying to process. An angel, sure, what the hell, if there are ghosts why not angels, but _alternate realities_? In which he (and his _brother_ ) were best buddies with an angel?

But how did he really know Castiel was an angel? All he had was the guy's word. Maybe he could heal people and kill ghosts, but if ghosts were real, there had to be other things with power out there, too. Evil things.

He turned back to face Castiel. "Prove to me you're an angel."

"How do you want me to do that?"

Good question. Heaven probably didn't issue smiting licenses. "Show me your halo. Angels have halos, right?"

"Yes," Castiel nodded. "But they are beyond the realm of human perception. If you saw mine, you would become blind and insane. And most likely incontinent."

Dean already felt pretty damn insane, but he didn't want to risk it with incontinence. "What about your wings, huh? If you're an angel, where's your wings?"

The maybe-angel smiled. "Yes. I can show you my wings. Follow me." He started to walk back toward the baseball field, his trench coat flapping a little as he swept around.

Dean stayed rooted to the spot. "Why do we have to go anywhere else?" That was one of his rules: never go with a strange adult to a second location, and Castiel here was pretty goddamn strange. "Why can't you whip 'em out here?"

"My wings are only perceptible to humans as shadow. I need—" Castiel bowed his head sheepishly. "I need an appropriate backdrop."

"Fine."

So Dean trailed Castiel by three steps, keeping a careful eye on the guy's back. They walked over to the edge of the field and Castiel stopped, scrutinizing the cheap, white-painted wood back of the dugout. Then, apparently satisfied, he turned to face Dean.

"So, you got your shot all lined up?" Dean asked, crossing his arms. "Or do you need to primp a little?"

"No," Castiel said, all seriousness, rolling his shoulders. "I'm ready. You may want to partially avert your gaze."

"Uh-huh," Dean said, staring dead ahead. "Sure."

Castiel raised his arms just a little, holding them away from his body. He takes a deep breath, blows it slowly out, and—

Dean had really expected something to happen, he realized. No, he hadn't just expected it, he'd wanted it. He'd stupidly, desperately wanted there to be a world where he had his little brother, where he had a friend willing to rush a marauding ghost for him, where people looked at him not with suspicion or anger or lust but _love_.

And now he was in some one-horse town full of douche bags and giggly girls, standing behind the dugout with a complete stranger who was making a constipated face as he tried to spread his _wings_.

So much for dreams, Dean thought. So much for hope. He scanned the trees and the bleachers for hidden cameras, and waited for someone to jump out and scream _"Can you believe it? Dean Winchester here really thought he was talking to an angel?_ "

Castiel glanced over his shoulder and frowned. "I'm sorry," he said. "I believe that my… _mojo_ has been depleted."

"Great. Why don't you somewhere really fucking far away and work on that?" Dean started to storm away, feeling the hope that had been welling in his chest harden and crystallize into anger and hate.

"Dean, wait!"

"Don't fucking talk to me, you freak! I don't know how you pulled this off, and how you knew about Sammy, but—"

Dean whipped around as he was about to tell Castiel—or whoever he was—to fuck the hell off, but the words died on his tongue, because Castiel's eyes were glowing.

White-blue light shone from his eyes, and then the light expanded to a bright and burning cloud which surrounded him. Castiel's body became smudged, his edges softened, fading in the radiant brilliance.

The light was bizarre and terrifying and beautiful, but it's the wings that knocked the air out of 5Dean's lungs and left him choking on nothing.

The wings were black, but not like his shirt was black and asphalt was black. This black was more like nothingness, like complete negation, as though whatever Castiel's wings were made of was swallowing a tiny pocket of the universe. The wings were like a portal to another plane of existence, something completely beyond human comprehension, and Dean didn't even care that his thoughts sounded like crappy poetry, that was how awesome they were.

Dean was so awestruck by Castiel's wings that it took him nearly a minute to realize there was something terribly wrong with them.

Even as Dean watched, too-black feathers were falling from them in clumps, leaving the wings ragged and frayed. And one of the wings, Dean saw with horror, one of the wings was bent, was _broken_ , its end hanging limply at Castiel's side.

The light abruptly winked out, and Castiel slumped against the dugout, exhausted, drops of blood running from his nose and staining his tan coat with growing blooms of bright red.

And Dean became convinced of three things: Castiel was an angel, Castiel was badly hurt and in trouble, and his life was about to get really, really weird.


End file.
